Warhol's Brillo Boxes were introduced in 1964 when a New York art gallery was filled with some 400 wooden boxes made to look exactly like the cartons of Brillo Soap Pads and other consumer products found in supermarkets. When asked about the genesis of these boxes, Warhol replied:
"Well...I'd done all the Campbell's Soup Cans in a row on the canvas, and then I got boxes made to do them on a box--but that looked funny because it didn't look real-I just had the boxes already made up though. They were brown and looked just like boxes, so I thought it would be great just to do an ordinary box."

The 100 Brillo Boxes in the Museum's collection are replicas of the 1964 originals that were made to order by Warhol in Pasadena for his 1970 retrospective exhibition at the former Pasadena Art Museum (now the Norton Simon Museum).